


Beholden

by thedevilchicken



Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: First Meetings, First Time, M/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-05
Updated: 2017-07-05
Packaged: 2018-11-28 06:47:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11412474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken
Summary: When they met, Billy had next to nothing.





	Beholden

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Airheart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Airheart/gifts).



When they met, Billy had next to nothing. He had the dusty clothes on his back and the long silver pins in his hair and Goody knew both those things were stolen: the clothes didn't fit right, and that wasn't just 'cause Billy Rocks looked like he hadn't had a meal that had filled him up all the way in a whole damn month of Sundays. That and Goody would've said those hairpins were worth ten times more than the bounty on him was, and that was pretty steep itself; there was no way on God's green earth that Billy had ever had the cash on hand to buy them with, at least not by legal means.

The first thing Goody bought him was a drink, once the fight was over and all the men who'd challenged him were bleeding to one of various degrees. The barkeep couldn't've found the guts to say no to what he asked even if tried real hard and he didn't try at all; when Goody sat on down at the bar, righting a fallen stool and swinging his leg over the top of it like he was mounting a horse and not sitting on furniture, when he waved him on out of his hidey-hole, the trembling fella would've sold his own mother to get out of there unharmed. So when Goody said, "A whisky for my friend, and one for me," he complied right quick, with a shaking hand. When Billy retrieved another stool and he sat hismelf down and he lifted his glass, his hands were steady. Goody's never known them not be.

"Thank you," Billy said, frowning, like maybe the drink was a trap and not just sub-par gut-rot.

"Thank _you_ ," Goody replied. "I ain't been so plain entertained in months, to tell the truth. You put on a hell of a show." 

Goody grinned at him like he meant it, 'cause he did - what Billy had done had been damn near a work of art to watch, a genuine thrill, and so much so that he'd known this was a bounty he wouldn't've collected if he could have, and that was by no means sure. Perhaps back in his heydey, but Goody knew enough to know that he was past his best. Then Billy nodded like he understood, and maybe he didn't exactly relax at that exactly point in time but he took his hand off of the hilt of the knife he'd got tucked into his belt, at least. Goody figured that was a pretty good start. He figured he could work with that.

The second thing Goody bought him was a meal, the hot kind, the plentiful kind that don't let up till your belly's full almost to bursting, and Billy peered at him over the plates and the bowls and a deep mug of fair-to-middling beer to wash it down with. Goody remembers talking all the while but he can't recall just what he said, remembers Billy listening like he gave a damn and in all likelihood he _does_ recall; all Goody knew at the time was Billy looked like he understood him even if he didn't offer much in the way of conversation in return. Goody figured he could live with that. After all, it'd been a long, long while since anyone had piqued his interest quite like Billy did.

The third thing was a room for the night, upstairs right there next door along the hall from his, and in all honesty he almost thought he'd open up the door of it once the sun came up and find that Billy Rocks had flown the coop. But there he was, sitting cross-legged right in the middle of the bed. The fact he was stripped to the waist didn't pass by Goody's attention. Nor did the knife not six inches from his hand.

"I don't know about you, friend, but I could damned near eat a horse," Goody said, loitering there in the doorway, leaning casually against the frame with the brim of his hat in his hands. "Maybe not _my_ horse, but for damn sure _a_ horse." 

"I think your horse would be glad to hear that," Billy said, deadpan, his fingers inching away from the knife. He pulled himself up from the bed and then slowly, consciously, turned his back to pick up his shirt, and Goody remembers how he grinned so broad he showed pretty close to all his teeth. He hadn't smiled like that in months.

"C'mon downstairs," he said. "We'll have some breakfast." Though he has to admit, as Billy dressed, breakfast was close to the last thing on his mind.

The fourth thing he bought him was breakfast, downstairs in the saloon. It for damned sure wasn't horsemeat, either.

They rode out of town together once they'd eaten up, with Billy hopped up close behind him and his hands at Goody's waist 'cause nobody in town would sell them a horse after what Billy had done, stubborn asses that they were. They rode twenty miles like that, and Goody talked and Billy sometimes even mustered a reply, someplace right by Goody's ear that tickled him and made him shiver, or maybe that was Billy's thighs pressed up to his. After that, the fifth thing he bought him was a horse the next town over, overpriced for what it was till someone called him _Goodnight Robicheaux_ and heads all turned and eyes all widened. They called him _Goodnight Robicheaux_ and he thinks maybe back then he even was, sometimes, to a greater or lesser extent. Maybe he shouldn't've been surprised how much the price went down by after that, but it sure seemed reasonable all of a sudden. 

Sixth was a suit that fit him more like a glove than it did a corn sack, the way the baggy shirt and pants he'd worn thus far had done. In the dusty room they shared after that, two separate beds but not a whole lot of space there to separate them, Goody read out loud from a shitty old dime novel and pretended like he wasn't watching Billy change his clothes. He pretended like he didn't see him strip right down to his bare naked skin in the flickering lantern light, like he didn't watch the way his muscles moved, like he didn't see his dick hang there thick and heavy from a thatch of near-black hair, like the story he was reading was the most fascinating thing in the whole damn world entirely. But still, as Billy pulled up his nice newly-purchased pants, Goody's gaze flickered up and that was it, he knew that he'd been caught red-handed. Billy was looking at him.

"You're staring," Billy pointed out, while he was tucking himself in.

"Well, it wasn't my intention to," Goody replied, and gestured at him with his book. "But I'm sorry to say my modesty was so affronted by all this ungodly nakedness I just didn't know where else to look."

Goody flashed him a grin. Billy ducked his head to hide a smile. He let it go.

Seventh was a shave in a barbershop and Billy acquiesced to it with his fingers gripping white at the arms of the chair as the razor grazed his throat, but he wouldn't have his hair cut afterwards; eighth was a pair of cheap-ass, bluntish scissors that Goody sharpened with a brand new whetstone (ninth) over dinner (tenth), and in the morning, when there was more light for them to see by than the last quarter-inch of a guttering candle, Goody watched Billy brush out his hair by the mirror then cut it shorter if not exactly short. Then he swept it back and put the silver pins back in, to hold what was left of it out of his eyes.

"I got places to be," Goody told him then, nudging a clump of cut-off hair with the toe of his boot. "Don't feel like you have to come with if it ain't in your direction."

"I owe you a debt," Billy replied, steadily, as he buttoned up his waistcoat. 

"You don't owe me anything," Goody said, hearing his voice turn sharp just at the edges. "Come with me 'cause you want to or else don't come along at all." 

Billy went with him. If Goody's honest - and he sometimes is, when it suits him to be - he was pleased as punch by that.

Six weeks later, Goody came into the crappy room that they were renting back then over the top of some godforsaken Texan saloon with a smile on his face in the mid-morning sun. He gave Billy a set of polished, sharpened knives; he could've watched Billy throw them for hours. Cumulatively, over the years, he guesses that he has.

Three weeks after that, Goody met him sitting at the bar once he'd claimed their latest bounty, not that Billy's name could go down on then official papers but he shared what they got fifty-fifty. He gave Billy a thick leather belt, custom-made for him now his weight was coming back up, slapped it onto the bar top and watched for the hint of a smile he was pretty sure would follow; later that night, after dinner, Goody wrapped the belt round Billy's waist and he buckled it up tight, then he slid Billy's gun and knives and bullets each into their place. Billy let him do it, trusting, like the way he'd sometimes let him shave him with his head tilted back and his throat all stretched out, not nearly as white-knuckled as the barber always made him. That night, he let him stand too close then closer still, Goody's fingers tucked down under the buckle of Billy's brand new belt. Billy let him shuffle closer then rest his forehead down on his. 

"You don't owe me anything," Goody said. 

"I owe you a debt," Billy replied. One hand slipped up to the back of Goody's neck. "But this is not how I'll repay it." 

When Billy stepped back and unbuckled his new gun belt, when he unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it to the floor, Goody understood. Everything they did was 'cause he wanted to.

Billy stripped himself naked while Goody watched him, finding himself disconcertingly mute all the while. He watched as Billy let down his hair, left the pins on the table, as he crossed to the edge of Goody's bed. He took the book from his hands and he tossed it away like the trash it pretty much was and when he pushed Goody down, when he straddled his clothed thighs, Billy's dick rested heavy at the buckle of Goody's belt and his hair hung down around his face. Goody reached up and pushed his fingers into it. He touched his face, his lips, his collarbones with almost shaking hands, ran his fingertips down the length of chest and abdomen, down to his hips. He traced a line down the insides of Billy's thighs with both his thumbs, then paused as he looked up at him. Billy smiled. When he looked like that, at him, Goody didn't think too much of wrapping one hand around Billy's cock. It seemed like the next natural course of action. 

Billy unbuckled Goody's belt. He unbuttoned Goody's pants and slipped one hand inside and Goody groaned out loud before he could think a sensible thought to stop himself. And he didn't undress but that didn't seem to matter all that much, not when Billy went down on his hands and knees beside him, not so much suggestive as a statement of intent, and Goody shuffled up behind him with his pants round his thighs and his boots still on. It didn't take a whole lot of imagination to spit in his hand for some good old-fashioned lubrication, or to rub his dick between Billy's thighs and reach around to stroke him, too, to hell with the fact his hands were rough 'cause Billy sure didn't complain. It didn't take a whole lot of smarts to lift his shirt up out of the way and tuck it up under his armpits, or to run his free hand down the length of Billy's bare back as he rocked his dick between Billy's thighs. It didn't take a whole lot of time for the two of them to finish, either, not with the friction of Billy's skin on his and the goddamn sense of urgency he felt, Billy spilling over Goody's hand onto the sheets and the head of Goody's cock pulsing pushed up tight there behind Billy's balls. It didn't take a whole lot of anything. It all felt a whole lot easier than he'd ever thought it could.

Then they shared a cigarillo once they'd wiped each other down, once Billy had pulled on his underwear at least if nothing else, the two of them sitting side-by-side against the headboards of their pulled-together single beds as Goody talked and talked and talked. Billy listened, quiet, like he always had, like he always does. And in the morning, when they'd washed and dressed and were about to leave the room to go search out some kind of breakfast, Goody leaned past Billy's shoulder and he pushed the door shut again before they could even make their exit. Goody turned Billy back around and kissed him, the way he'd not kissed anyone in years, his fingers tight in Billy's hair, mouth to mouth, hard and dumb and passionate. Billy kissed him back till they were breathless and for once Goody found he was lost for words; when Billy went down on his knees, however, he found his voice again. He had a few things to say about it, complimentary in the main. They'd apparently decided that breakfast could wait.

Over time, the way of things has changed between them. These days it's not Goody bringing home the bacon - it's Billy does the fighting, does the shooting, does the killing, because he knows that Goody can't though neither of them really mentions that. Goody's grateful for it, too, even if the fact is sometimes he has words to say everything else that he means but that, and then another hundred things he doesn't mean on top. He's grateful Billy's never left, and grateful that they ever met at all. Sometimes, he makes him feel just like he's Goodnight Robicheaux. Sometimes he makes him feel like it wouldn't matter if he never is again.

Billy lights a cigarillo, takes a drag then hands it on, and Goody puffs at it for one good long moment before he hands it back. They share a breath that's full of smoke. They share a knowing look betwen them. Goody knows they've shared a whole lot more.

When they met, Billy had next to nothing; truth be told, Goody had even less than that. 

In the end, he knows Billy's not the one that owes a debt.


End file.
